Fairfax County GT/AAP Appeals.

[Anonymous]

1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well...I would appeal to them, and ask why the AAP process is done in secret with no one to be held accountable for an obvious error in judegement. I am refering to SKR's DC. I do NOT know SKR. but her DCs numbers look too good to not be in AAP. I would ask for an objective answer to why DC was not found eligible. I know that I will be visiting Dr. Z (cluster 8) and Patty Reed (Providence) if DC is not accepted, as DC has very simialr scores and meets the AAP qualifications on paper. Also, I believe that a parent knows best, an involved parent, and I don't understand why 5 random people who do not know my child are making such a HUGE educational decision. Good luck. Please post back what happens, and if I knew you, I would roll along to Gatehouse to be there for support.

THANK YOU! It means a lot to know that I am right. It's been hard with the school as well, and I just know in my heart this was a wrong decision. That's exactly what I asked the teacher and the AART. Exceptf ro me and the classroom teacher who spend sall day with my DC, who really knows my child and the teacher admitted her scores were higher than what went into the file.

I'll post back here of course but this whole anon naming of the forum makes it difficult finding continuity with the posters

skr

Are you saying that the local screening committee (at the school) submitted a lower GBRS than what the classroom teacher had recommended?

Yes.
They had a discussion and they came up with the numbers. They include (principal, asst principal, (who donno my kid) AART (who meets with her once a week for 45 minutes) and the advanced Math teacher was not even on the committee (who my DC meets with everyday)

I would think that this could be mentioned in an appeal letter or at Gatehouse. It certainly seems that the teacher, who spends the most time with your DC, would have the best opportunity to observe gifted behaviors for the GBRS. And it doesn't seem right that the advanced math teacher would not have been on the committee. I hope that you are able to get some good answers and appropriate placement for your DC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:WTF, this is too wierd. 130 WISC and still not in? Have you met with your cluster office and/or school board member? I would do that next. Good luck! If you need moral support, know what I, too, am appealing and getting a WISC done for my DC next week (Dr. Dahlgren). Don't give up, don't go away, keep on trucking. Know what may of us are there for you in spirit.

We had a WISC higher than 130 and didn't get in. GBRS was pretty good, not amazing, but not bad either. Would you do anything else but appeal? What would you say if you met with the cluster officer or school board member?

you are going to meet with a school board member over this? Man, some people will not take NO for an answer.

hire a lawyer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:WTF, this is too wierd. 130 WISC and still not in? Have you met with your cluster office and/or school board member? I would do that next. Good luck! If you need moral support, know what I, too, am appealing and getting a WISC done for my DC next week (Dr. Dahlgren). Don't give up, don't go away, keep on trucking. Know what may of us are there for you in spirit.

We had a WISC higher than 130 and didn't get in. GBRS was pretty good, not amazing, but not bad either. Would you do anything else but appeal? What would you say if you met with the cluster officer or school board member?

you are going to meet with a school board member over this? Man, some people will not take NO for an answer.

hire a lawyer.

Everyone has a right to appeal. It is part of the process. Re: school board member I'm sure that the reason for the meeting will need to be stated for the meeting to be scheduled, and the meeting would not happen if the board member felt that the topic was not appropriate. I can see people wanting to know reasons for decisions when at least on the surface some lower numbers seem to have resulted in eligibility and higher numbers in ineligibility. Perhaps some standardized notes should be added to ineligibility letters so that people would have an idea why the committee felt their DC would not be a good match for level IV services. For example it could say "Reason for Denial" and 3,4,8, and a key could say 3=GBRS, 4=Grades, 8=Not currently receiving advanced services.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Are you saying that the local screening committee (at the school) submitted a lower GBRS than what the classroom teacher had recommended?

Yes.
They had a discussion and they came up with the numbers. They include (principal, asst principal, (who donno my kid) AART (who meets with her once a week for 45 minutes) and the advanced Math teacher was not even on the committee (who my DC meets with everyday)

I would think that this could be mentioned in an appeal letter or at Gatehouse. It certainly seems that the teacher, who spends the most time with your DC, would have the best opportunity to observe gifted behaviors for the GBRS. And it doesn't seem right that the advanced math teacher would not have been on the committee. I hope that you are able to get some good answers and appropriate placement for your DC.

This is normal practice. It is, in fact, done so that one person does not have total say in coming up with the gbrs. As you know, there are lots of complaints by parents who say that DC's teacher does not like him/her and gave a bad gbrs, blah blah blah. My understanding is that the teacher comes up with the gbrs first and then the group discusses and the gbrs gets moved up or down. If no one else can corroborate the "4" that the teacher gives then the "4" may get reduced to a "3" and so on. This happened with my DC and she got one point reduced in every section for a total of 4 points. But again, the flip side of that is, it controls the possible partiality/favoritism that could exist if you had just the class teacher doing whatever she wanted.

[Anonymous]

I think it's also attended to help standardize the procedure across the schools. Some teachers would give everyone 16's while others would assign everyone 12's. If more people are involved, it's less likely to turn of "luck of the draw" with the individual teacher.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well...I would appeal to them, and ask why the AAP process is done in secret with no one to be held accountable for an obvious error in judegement. I am refering to SKR's DC. I do NOT know SKR. but her DCs numbers look too good to not be in AAP. I would ask for an objective answer to why DC was not found eligible. I know that I will be visiting Dr. Z (cluster 8) and Patty Reed (Providence) if DC is not accepted, as DC has very simialr scores and meets the AAP qualifications on paper. Also, I believe that a parent knows best, an involved parent, and I don't understand why 5 random people who do not know my child are making such a HUGE educational decision. Good luck. Please post back what happens, and if I knew you, I would roll along to Gatehouse to be there for support.

Parents are inherently biased in favor of their kids. Parents are not the best judge....

Appeal...mention what the teacher said. I hope you have documented data. Or some other info.

Let us know how the meeting with the school board goes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well...I would appeal to them, and ask why the AAP process is done in secret with no one to be held accountable for an obvious error in judegement. I am refering to SKR's DC. I do NOT know SKR. but her DCs numbers look too good to not be in AAP. I would ask for an objective answer to why DC was not found eligible. I know that I will be visiting Dr. Z (cluster 8) and Patty Reed (Providence) if DC is not accepted, as DC has very simialr scores and meets the AAP qualifications on paper. Also, I believe that a parent knows best, an involved parent, and I don't understand why 5 random people who do not know my child are making such a HUGE educational decision. Good luck. Please post back what happens, and if I knew you, I would roll along to Gatehouse to be there for support.

Parents are inherently biased in favor of their kids. Parents are not the best judge....

Appeal...mention what the teacher said. I hope you have documented data. Or some other info.

Let us know how the meeting with the school board goes.

Now it's the whole board? Would love to see this....:0

[Anonymous]

Oh how I would love to hear the school board react to someone insisting that their dc must be admitted to AAP because he/she did just as we'll as the other potentially fictional kids on an anonymous message board.

[Anonymous]

5 objective people are making the decision BECAUSE of parents like you. BTW I think it's 6 people.

[Anonymous]

Does anyone else's school have their local committee assign the GBRS to in pool candidates first, before referrals are even due, and then the referrals only after they get referred? Seems like with this method, referred students already have bias against them since the teachers know they didn't make the pool.

[Anonymous]

The teachers know in 1st how tey do on the nnat so yes maybe they are biased . I assume the 2nd grade teacher snow how they do as well so yes maybe they are biased. Who knows?

[Anonymous]

SKR, It's me again, the on who supports you! Please let us/me know what you decide to do. Parents are the best advocate! Teachers have a ton of students (30+) and you know what is best. Parents always know what is best. Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:SKR, It's me again, the on who supports you! Please let us/me know what you decide to do. Parents are the best advocate! Teachers have a ton of students (30+) and you know what is best. Parents always know what is best. Good luck!

Thanks.
I have to appeal. The Stanford-Binet and the WJ scores are good. Dr. Dahlgren asked me to go for it. 50-50 chance, as the GBRS will continue to hurt my DC. If not this year, next year and hope to get a fair enough teacher/school who will do the right thing.
However, my Dc will not continue here. After knowing what they did, I have no faith in the school admin that they will ever be fair and give her an honest grading on GBRS.

Timing's off, very badly. It affects all of us differently.

[Anonymous]

Is GBRS 6 too low to overcome? We have an appointment with Dr. Dalgren next week but just wanted to hear from you all about our dc's chances. In a what score range of the WISC does my dc needs to settle in to overcome that crazy GBRS? Thanks.